Philippine and Global Perspectives on Aging

OPS recently hosted a research forum on "Philippine and Global Perspectives on Aging" last June 11, 2014 at the Josef Baumgartner Learning Resource Center, University of San Carlos, Talamban Campus, Cebu City. This forum gathered Filipino and US-based researchers who presented findings from their respective studies on aging. Dr. Socorro Gultiano of OPS opened the forum with her presentation on the Demography of Aging in the Philippines. This set the stage for eight presentations on Philippine studies on aging. Dr. Linda Adair of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Principal Investigator of the Cebu Longitudinal Health and Nutrition Survey (CLHNS), presented the conceptual framework and preliminary findings of the latest CLHNS study "Multidimensional Pathways to Healthy Aging among Filipino Women" with Dr. Judith Borja and Ms. Lorna Perez of OPS. Dr. Grace Cruz of the University of the Philippines Population Institute (UPPI) compared health status of older Filipinos using data from the 1996 Philippine Elderly Survey and the 2007 Philippine Study on Aging (PSA). Dr. Josefina Natividad also of UPPI presented the PSA findings on depression, health and social connectedness. Dr. Shelley de la Vega and Dr. Leah Palapar of the Institute on Aging of the University of the Philippines Manila National Institutes of Health presented initial findings from their studies on "Status of Dementia Care Services and Workforce" and "State of the Art on Researches on Aging in the Philipppines" respectively. Dr. Sharon Linog of the Research Institute for Mindanao Culture gave a talk on "Malnutrition and Preventable Risk Factors Among Older People in Cagayan de Oro City". To provide relevant context to the findings on the Philippine aging experience, OPS also invited three of its CLHNS collaborators to talk about their respective researches on aging in other countries: Dr. Feinian Chen of the University of Maryland "Grandparents Caring for Grandchildren in China: Intergenerational Ties in Context and Its Health Implications for Older Adults", Dr. Zachary Zimmer of the University of California San Francisco "Migration, Location and the Provision of Support to Aging Parents in Romania" and
Dr. Benjamin Capistrant of the the University of Minnesota "Cross-National Comparisons of Mobility Measures and Correlates: Evidence from the Study on Ageing and Adult Health". Invited discussants were Dr. Alan Feranil (OPS), Dr. Celine Aquino (Cebu Institute of Medicine), Dr. Jacqueline Dominguez (Institute of Neurosciences, St. Luke's Medical Center), and Dr. Nimfa Ogena (UPPI). The audience consisted of members of the academe, government and non-government sectors, research agencies, health workers and practitioners from various parts of the country, the media, and representatives from the United Nations Population Fund and the Philippine Center for Population and Development. The forum received support from the Commission on Population Region 7 Office, UPPI, Philippine Population Association, Verbo San Carlos Foundation, Inc. and the University of San Carlos. Dr. Fiscalina Nolasco and Mr. Frank Largo of USC were the forum moderators. For pdf copies of the presentations please send an email to uscops@gmail.com.